I saw my friend Curt, yesterday. We went to a restaurant in the building next his hagwon (that he owns) that we sometimes go to. We ate bibimbap with tasty veggies, and his daughter (around age 8 or 9?) was as shy as usual.
Later, he wanted to talk about what it takes to build a compelling a curriculum at the elementary level. I have some ideas, and I know he wants to hear them, but in some ways they run counter to what most Koreans believe a hagwon should be.
My dream would be to build an “Arts” hagwon that just coincidentally happens to be in English. The idea is to teach English “by accident” while the kids are having fun doing art projects, drama projects, music projects. I would want to strongly encourage team and peer teaching, too, and my work with my “town building class” over the summer confirms that finding an “intrinsic motivator” (like having a complex classroom economy with lots of fake money in circulation) is a great way to keep kids engaged and help them forget they’re bored.
Curt wants me to write something up about all this. I’m going to try – the above paragraph constitutes a “back-of-napkin” draft of a statement of purpose, maybe.
I walked around Ilsan a little bit, then I took the subway back to the bus terminal and got on a sunset bus bound straight for Glory [Yeonggwang]. I took some pictures.
Some trees live in Ilsan.
Looking north from a pedestrian bridge on the Juyeop esplanade.
Turning to the right on the same pedestrian bridge, look – a Domino’s.
Some girls at play at a fountain on Juyeop esplanade.
Here is the street I like to call “Academy Road” [real name is Ilsan-no = Ilsan Avenue]. Looking west (can you see North Korea? It’s just behind that hill in the far distance). All the buildings’ inifitude of signs are advertising hagwons.
Looking east, more hagwons, including my 3 former places of work (all clustered in two blocks along the right side).
Here is the Honam Line bus terminal, looking down on some ticket windows. Seoul’s main express bus terminal is confusing, because it’s actually more than one terminal, separated by several blocks of mall-like real estate. Honam Line serves the southwest part of the country.
As I was looking out the bus window, the sun set near Osan.
People kept smiling at me, today. Randomly. This isn’t typical, in Korea, where strangers ignore (at best) or are gruff (at worst) with other strangers. Are Koreans in a good mood, because of the holiday? Or am I putting off some weird “good mood” vibe that people are picking up?
